Merchants find it increasingly effective to make various offers available in certain online forums. For example, a merchant (e.g., a provider of some good or service) may make offers available to users via a networking system. To illustrate, the merchant may have a social networking profile and corresponding profile page on a networking system. The merchant can use the networking system to compose a post and share the post with other users of the networking system (e.g., users who have “liked” or who “follow” the merchant's profile page). Among other things, the merchant can use a social networking post to share information regarding a particular offer or promotion available from the merchant. The networking system can then distribute the post, including the offer or promotion information, to users by adding the post to the users' newsfeeds, for example.
Although sharing information in this way can be somewhat effective in promoting a merchant's goods or services, it is often inefficient and fails to leverage the various resources and features available for promoting products through a networking system. For example, networking systems typically make no distinction between a standard post including an offer (e.g., a special promotion) and any other standard social networking post. As a result, the networking system typically only distributes the merchant's post to users that are already familiar with the merchant (e.g., users that have “liked” or “followed” the merchant on the networking system). Accordingly, if the merchant uses standard post functionality, the resulting post is inherently limited in the audience it reaches, and may not reach many users that would be interested in the merchant's offer. In addition, the merchant's standard posts are easily lost among all the other standard posts included in a networking system user's newsfeed. As a result of the foregoing, a merchant's sales and exposure on the networking system are inherently limited.
Furthermore, by providing offers to networking system users via standard networking system posts, the merchant generally receives no further information regarding the effectiveness of the provided offer. For example, although a merchant may be notified of likes, comments, and shares received by the post, the merchant has only circumstantial data to indicate whether the post was successful in leading to sales of the merchant's product being offered. Thus, the merchant is unable to accurately determine a conversion rate or a click rate for the provided offer.
Additionally, by providing offers within standard networking system posts, the merchant misses out on more robust tools that the networking system makes available to merchants. For example, in one or more embodiments, the networking system offers tools that allow merchants to target audiences, track offer usage, and further promote the offers within the networking system. The merchant, however, cannot utilize or benefit from these tools when the merchant's offers are only shared by way of standard social networking posts.
As such, a number of disadvantages exist with conventional methods and systems for promoting offers using a networking system.